Freddie Wong

Last updated
Freddie Wong
Freddie Wong WikiPortrait at SXSW 2024 Taken March 13, 2024.jpg
Wong at South by Southwest 2024
Born (1985-09-13) September 13, 1985 (age 38)
Seattle, Washington, U.S.
Alma mater University of Southern California
Occupations
  • filmmaker
  • VFX artist
  • podcaster
Years active2006–present
Known for Video Game High School
Notable work"RocketJump: The Show"
Relatives
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese 黃穀子
Simplified Chinese 黄谷子
Jyutping Wong4 Guk1Zi2

Freddie Wong (born September 13, 1985) [1] is an American internet celebrity, filmmaker, VFX artist, podcaster, and competitive gamer. [2] Wong has participated in at least three YouTube channels; with RocketJump, his production company's main channel, sporting over 9 million subscribers; [3] BrandonJLa, a channel including behind the scenes videos and other content, which holds over 1.1 million subscribers; [4] and Node, a gaming channel with over 3.2 million subscribers. [5] He is also known for creating the web series Video Game High School . [6]

Contents

Early life

Wong was born and raised in Seattle, Washington. He graduated from Lakeside School in 2004 [7] and later from the University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts. [1] Wong owns and manages Overcrank Media, a Los Angeles–based media production company specializing in feature film and online video content, having produced an independent film titled Bear . Wong met his future collaborator Brandon Laatsch in college. [8]

Career

2006–2010: Competitive gaming, YouTube breakthrough

Wong launched a YouTube channel in 2006, initially uploading gameplay footage to wide success, and competed in the World Series of Video Games in Dallas in July 2007. [9] He won first prize in the Guitar Hero 2 competition, playing the song "Less Talk More Rokk" by Freezepop. [10] [11] It was around this time that he began uploading videos to YouTube and finding popularity with his comedic or video game-related content.

During MTV's "Gamer's Week" celebration in November 2007, Freddie appeared as a guest on Total Request Live . [12] Participating in the program with his newly formed band Hellanor Brozevelt, Wong was part of a country-wide search to find the best Rock Band ensemble. After receiving tutelage from well-known rockers Good Charlotte, Brozevelt performed at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York against Chicago-based Carrie Me Home. [13]

In 2010, Wong helped Joe Penna, known as MysteryGuitarMan on YouTube, shoot a commercial for McDonald's, [14] and assisted Wong Fu Productions in actions scenes of Agents of Secret Stuff . [15] In 2011 Wong produced, co-directed, and acted in a TV commercial for Battlefield 3 at the request of Electronic Arts. [16] [17]

2011–2017: RocketJump shorts and Video Game High School

Wong at VidCon 2014 Freddie Wong (14352161350) (cropped).jpg
Wong at VidCon 2014

In 2011, along with his partners Matt Arnold and Desmond "Dez" Dolly, Wong formed the production company RocketJump. They began work on the web series Video Game High School, [18] which began releasing episodes on May 11, 2012, achieved over 100 million views across various online platforms. The series was based on a concept by Will Campos and Chris Pappavaselio. The team was able to raise funding for the series through Kickstarter, where they set a funding goal for $75,000 to be raised in a 30-day period. That amount was quickly pledged in less than 24 hours and continued to climb from there. On October 22, 2011, pledging came to a close, with $273,725 raised for the project from 5,661 backers. [19] The series ran for three seasons, with the final season having a crowd funded budget of over $2.4 million. The final episode of the series was released November 17, 2014, on the RocketJump website and YouTube.

Wong's videos would sometimes feature celebrity cameos, with Jimmy Kimmel in a bathroom tie battle, Andy Whitfield appearing in a Time Crisis tribute video, Kevin Pollak appearing in a Hypnotism stunt, Shenae Grimes in a romantic gun action scene, Ray William Johnson in a troll infestation video, Eliza Dushku appearing in an action scene, Jon Favreau featuring in his video based on Cowboys & Aliens , the glam metal band Steel Panther appearing in his video based on the Crossfire board game, and Smosh appearing in his video "Huge Guns (with Smosh)". [20]

In late 2013, Wong's channel, freddiew was renamed to "Rocketjump", and freddiew2 was renamed to "BrandonJLa". Brandon Laatsch also announced that he and Wong would no longer work together on projects, and any short videos or "shorts" would be posted on either NODE (a gaming channel run by Laatsch and Corridor Digital's Niko Pueringer and Sam Gorski) or BrandonJLa. This was done because they wanted to work on separate projects, as Wong was busy with Video Game High School, [21] and Brandon started working on a VR engine and game Boneworks .

In 2017, Wong announced that RocketJump would be pivoting away from regular shorts, in favor of other projects. [22] RocketJump stopped uploading videos altogether in 2018, after the second season of Anime Crimes Division. [23]

Since 2017: Podcasting and feature film

From April 2017 to October 2021, Wong co-hosted the podcast Story Break on the Maximum Fun network. [24] [25] As described on the RocketJump website, the show features "[co-hosts] Will Campos, Matt Arnold, and Freddie Wong sit[ting] down in the RocketJump writer's room and attempt[ing] to 'break' a story for a ridiculous concept, property, or idea that [they] in NO way have any rights to." The podcast concluded in 2021, both due to the hosts feeling creatively satisfied with the show and to allow them more time to work on upcoming projects. [26]

Since January 2019, Wong has been a collaborator on a Dungeons & Dragons actual play podcast called Dungeons & Daddies , along with Will Campos, Anthony Burch, Matt Arnold, and Beth May. The podcast is about four dads from Earth that are transported to the Forgotten Realms (one of the official settings for Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition) and go on a quest to search for their lost sons. Wong edits the show and is one of the four players, with Burch as the Dungeon Master. [27] [28] [29]

On October 21, 2021, RocketJump revealed on Facebook that they were beginning work on their first feature film. [30] Shooting took place in late 2021 in Southern California and Utah. The film, We're All Gonna Die, is set to premiere at South by Southwest in March 2024. Wong co-wrote and co-directed the film with his Dungeons & Daddies co-star Matt Arnold. [31]

In 2023, Wong appeared in Dimension 20 's sidequest Mentopolis, where he played the character Dan Fucks.

Personal life

Wong is the older brother of actor and YouTuber Jimmy Wong, who co-starred in Video Game High School. [32] [33] His father is Chinese, from Canton, and his mother is of Chinese and Mongol ancestry. [34] His uncle is Corey Yuen, a film director and stunt choreographer. [35] [ better source needed ]

Filmography

YearTitleRoleOther notes
2010 Bear Producer
2010BDS9Himself
2011 Chuck FreddieTV series; guest appearance in "Chuck Versus the Hack Off"
2012–14 Video Game High School HimselfWeb series; also co-creator, co-director, story writer, executive producer
2013 MyMusic DJ ElephantTV series; episode: "Ghosts!!!"
2013 Bee and Puppycat Tim WizardWeb Series; episode: “Donut”
2013 Key & Peele PingTV series; guest appearance in episode 3.07
2013The GauntletHimselfWeb series; season 2 regular
2014 Rob Dyrdek's Fantasy Factory HimselfTV series; episode: "Fully Uploaded"
2015The Strongest ManJimmy YoonFilm
2015RocketJump: The ShowHimselfAlso co-creator, co-director, writer, executive producer, editor
2016 Red vs. Blue Guest writer and director of "The #1 Movie in the Galaxy: 3" episode
2017 Dimension 404 Director ("Impulse") and executive producer
2017–18Anime Crimes DivisionDirector and co-creator [36]
2019–present Dungeons & Daddies Glenn Close, Taylor Swift, and others Actual play podcast; main role [29]
2023 Dimension 20: Mentopolis Dan FucksActual play web series; 6 episodes [37] [38]
2024We're All Gonna DieDirectorFilm; co-director and co-writer

Related Research Articles

In shooter games, rocket jumping is the technique of using the knockback of an explosive weapon, most often a rocket launcher, to launch the shooter into the air. The aim of this technique is to reach heights, distances and speed that standard character movement cannot achieve. Although the origin of rocket jumping is unclear, its usage was popularized by Quake.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jimmy Wong</span> American actor and singer (born 1987)

James Franklin Wong is an American actor and musician. He is best known for his 2011 music video, "Ching Chong: Asians in the Library Song" and for his role as Ted in the web series Video Game High School. In 2017, he and YouTuber Meghan Camarena co-hosted the video game themed variety show Polaris Primetime, which was created as part of Disney's "D|XP" programming block on Disney XD.

GameTrailers (GT) was an American video gaming website created by Geoffrey R. Grotz and Brandon Jones in 2002. The website specialized in multimedia content, including trailers and gameplay footage of upcoming and recently released video games, as well as an array of original video content focusing on video games, including reviews, countdown shows, and other web series.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rhett & Link</span> YouTube comedy duo

Rhett James McLaughlin and Charles Lincoln "Link" Neal III are an American comedy duo. Self-styled as "Internetainers", they are known for creating and hosting the YouTube series Good Mythical Morning. Their other notable projects include comedic songs and sketches, their IFC series Rhett & Link: Commercial Kings, their YouTube Premium series Rhett & Link's Buddy System, their podcast Ear Biscuits and their novel The Lost Causes of Bleak Creek.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Smosh</span> American YouTube comedy channel

Smosh is an American YouTube sketch comedy-improv collective, independent production company, and former social networking site founded by Anthony Padilla and Ian Hecox. In 2002, Padilla created a website named "smosh.com" for making Flash animations, and he was later joined by Hecox. They began to post videos on Smosh's YouTube channel in the fall of 2005 and quickly became one of the most popular channels on the site. The Smosh channel has over 10 billion views and over 25 million subscribers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cory Williams</span> American YouTube personality

Cory Williams, also known as Mr. Safety, is an American YouTube personality who currently resides in Oklahoma.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wong Fu Productions</span> American filmmaking group

Wong Fu Productions is an American filmmaking group founded by Wesley Chan, Ted Fu, and Philip Wang. The trio met at the University of California, San Diego in 2004 and produced a number of music videos and short films released on their website and later YouTube before establishing a professional media company, Sketchbook Media, after their graduation. Their works have been featured at a number of national and international film festivals, including the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival and the San Diego Asian Film Festival.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harley Morenstein</span> Canadian Internet personality (born 1985)

Harley Morenstein is a Canadian Internet personality. He co-created, produces, and hosts the YouTube show Epic Meal Time and its FYI television spin-off series Epic Meal Empire. He also runs a vlog channel. He is one of the two remaining original members of the show along with Ameer Atari.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jenna Marbles</span> American YouTube personality (born 1986)

Jenna Nicole Mourey, better known as Jenna Marbles, is an American YouTuber. Over the span of ten years, her YouTube channel has accumulated approximately 1.8 billion video views and, at its peak, over 20 million subscribers. After apologizing for a series of accusations involving offensive content in her older videos, Marbles announced her indefinite hiatus from the platform in 2020.

Hey Ash, Whatcha Playin'? (HAWP) is an independently produced series of sketch comedy videos created by siblings Anthony Burch and Ashly Burch. The series uses surreal humor and comical sibling rivalry to examine the themes, industry trends, and societal impact of video games, with each episode typically focusing on a single game. HAWP was hosted on Destructoid for its first year of production, and syndicated to GameTrailers until 2013, and has since become independently distributed, most notably on YouTube. As of September 2020, the series has received over 60 million views.

Brandon Laatsch is an American game developer, filmmaker, and YouTuber known for directing Video Game High School, founding the game company Stress Level Zero, and other online video content.

<i>Video Game High School</i> American web series

Video Game High School is an American action comedy web series from RocketJump Studios. It was written by Matthew Arnold, Will Campos and Brian Firenzi and directed by Matthew Arnold, Brandon Laatsch, and Freddie Wong. RocketJump Studios describes the series as "a show about best friends, first loves, and landing that perfect head shot". The team at RocketJump chose to make a web series because they "strongly believe the foundations for the future of digitally distributed content will be laid by web series".

A multi-channel network (MCN) is an organization that works with video platforms to offer assistance to channel owners in areas such as "product, programming, funding, cross-promotion, partner management, digital rights management, monetization and sales, and audience development," in exchange for a percentage of the ad revenue from the channel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Defy Media</span> Defunct American digital media company

Defy Media was an American digital media company that produced original online content for the 12–34 age group. Originally founded in 1996 as Alloy Online, the final company was formed in 2013 by its merger with Break Media.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corridor Digital</span> American production studio

Corridor Digital is an American production studio based in Los Angeles, known for creating pop-culture-related viral online short-form videos since 2010, as well as producing and directing the Battlefield-inspired web series Rush and the YouTube Premium series Lifeline. It has also created television commercials for various companies, including Machine Zone and Google.

<i>Dungeons & Daddies</i> Comedy podcast

Dungeons & Daddies is an actual play comedy podcast. First aired in January 2019, the podcast has featured three main seasons, as well as some mini campaigns. Primary cast members are Matt Arnold, Anthony Burch, Will Campos, Beth May, and Freddie Wong.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">OutsideXbox</span> British YouTube group

OutsideXbox, or Oxbox, is a British YouTube channel and group consisting of Jane Douglas, Andy Farrant and Mike Channell. The group also has a sister channel, Outside Xtra, or Oxtra, consisting of Luke Westaway and Ellen Rose. The group is best known for video games commentary, journalism, and gameplay. The channel also hosts the Oxventure, a real-play TTRPG tabletop role-playing game series primarily encompassing Dungeons & Dragons but occasionally others such as Blades in the Dark and Deadlands and featuring fellow YouTuber Johnny Chiodini and which was later launched as its own channel. The group has a combined 3.74 million subscribers and 1.81 billion views across all three channels as of November 2023.

References

  1. 1 2 Rolph, Amy (July 16, 2007). "Seattle's 'Hero' struts into rock stardom". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Retrieved July 23, 2010.
  2. ↑ Wong, Freddie (September 13, 2012). "Hitting 27 today – thanks everyone!". Twitter. Retrieved September 13, 2012.
  3. ↑ Statistics retrieved on March 18, 2016, at RocketJump's channel on YouTube.
  4. ↑ Statistics retrieved on March 18, 2016, at BrandonJLa's channel on YouTube.
  5. ↑ Statistics retrieved on October 16, 2016, at Node's channel on YouTube.
  6. ↑ "Here's How Freddie Wong Used $2,435,434 To Make 'VGHS' Season Three". Tubefilter. May 12, 2015. Retrieved January 16, 2017.
  7. ↑ Owen, Rob (November 30, 2015). "Seattle filmmaker Freddie Wong's work makes jump to Hulu". The Seattle Times. Retrieved March 16, 2024.
  8. ↑ Orzeck, Kurt (December 21, 2011). "YouTube Sensation Freddie Wong: 'Hollywood Is Out of Date' (Exclusive)". Reuters. Retrieved June 21, 2017.
  9. ↑ "This Channel Still Exists? (The Script!)". August 24, 2017.
  10. ↑ Freddie Wong 10 on STYLE -Less Talk More Rokk on YouTube video of the second half of Freddie's winning performance
  11. ↑ World Series of Video Games Archived July 11, 2011, at the Wayback Machine - Freddiew's blog post dated July 16, 2007.
  12. ↑ "The Going Thing- freddiew.com". Archived from the original on July 11, 2011. Retrieved October 10, 2010.
  13. ↑ "'Rock Band' Rock Off". MTV . Retrieved July 21, 2014.
  14. ↑ Freddie Wong Twitter Update – Twitter, 2011.
  15. ↑ Nigahiga (November 24, 2010). "Agents of Secret Stuff". YouTube. Archived from the original on December 21, 2021. Retrieved July 1, 2012.
  16. ↑ Battlefield 3 – FreddieW TV Commercial on YouTube, 2011
  17. ↑ 10 Days to Air – -BF3 TV commercial Behind the Scenes on YouTube, 2011.
  18. ↑ "Video Game High School Archives".
  19. ↑ "Video Game High School". Kickstarter. October 21, 2011. Retrieved May 13, 2012.
  20. ↑ FreddieW (January 13, 2011). "Huge Guns (with Smosh!)". YouTube. Archived from the original on December 21, 2021. Retrieved August 6, 2012.
  21. ↑ "Phase Two". www.youtube.com. Archived from the original on December 21, 2021.
  22. ↑ "This Channel Still Exists? (The Script!)". www.rocketjump.com. August 24, 2017.
  23. ↑ "RocketJump - YouTube". www.youtube.com.
  24. ↑ "Story Break". Archived from the original on July 19, 2018. Retrieved July 19, 2018.
  25. ↑ "Story Break". November 14, 2017. Retrieved July 19, 2018.
  26. ↑ "Story Break | #169". Maximum Fun. October 8, 2021. Retrieved October 25, 2021.
  27. ↑ Koss, Nakiesha (June 1, 2020). "Stepping into the Adventurous World of Podcasting with "Dungeons & Daddies"". Adobe Blog. Retrieved August 8, 2023.
  28. ↑ "Interview with D&D Podcast "Dungeons & Daddies"". Cosplay Realm Magazine. April 8, 2020. Retrieved January 10, 2021.
  29. 1 2 "Dungeons & Daddies". Dungeons & Daddies. Retrieved December 12, 2020.
  30. ↑ RocketJump (October 21, 2021). "We're shooting our first feature, and we're looking for anybody who owns a 90s era import tuner (the more tricked out the better!) in the SoCal/Utah/Arizona area. We'd pay to use it for our shoot in November - hit us up!". Facebook. Retrieved November 7, 2021.
  31. ↑ "We're All Gonna Die". SXSW Schedule. Retrieved March 1, 2024.
  32. ↑ Roderick, Kevin (March 24, 2011). "Jimmy Wong as Internet savior". LA Observed. Retrieved May 9, 2012.
  33. ↑ "Never stop working. If you're doing something you love, then it shouldn't be a problem". The Other Asians. July 7, 2011. Archived from the original on April 12, 2013. Retrieved May 9, 2012.
  34. ↑ Nguyen, Stacy (April 7, 2011). "Hit singer Jimmy Wong on Alexandra Wallace and why angry responses are unproductive". Northwest Asian Weekly. Retrieved June 20, 2021.
  35. ↑ Stuntwomen React to Bad & Great Hollywood Stunts 9. Corridor Crew. April 3, 2021. Event occurs at 9:33 – via YouTube.
  36. ↑ Wong, Alex (December 24, 2017). "Crunchyroll Isn't Worried About Netflix and Amazon Focusing More on Anime". www.inverse.com.
  37. ↑ Carter, Chase (July 26, 2023). "Dimension 20's new Mentopolis series is a noir-flavoured RPG mind romp featuring Hank Green and Freddie Wong". Dicebreaker . Retrieved August 8, 2023.
  38. ↑ Sheehan, Gavin (July 27, 2023). "Dropout Announces Next Live-Action Series Dimension 20: Mentopolis". Bleeding Cool . Retrieved August 8, 2023.

Further reading

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.